The rest of the table chuckled quietly. Keiko Tashiro lowered her eyes and tried to look suitably modest.
“Thank you. Every memory of Ayuko is precious.” Kotaro bowed again and hurried away, bottles and glasses clinking. His heart was pounding.
Keiko Tashiro. A member of Ayuko’s college cycling club. That was more than enough information. Finding out the rest would be simple.
But he’d made a bigger discovery.
I can read people’s words.
The first threads he’d seen belonged to Kazumi. He’d heard her words and seen the threads. With Galla, he had seen her words, like silver arrows, and heard them directly.
Now he’d reached another level. He’d been able to read the meaning of the wriggling threads inside Keiko Tashiro’s doppelgänger.
Of course, he hadn’t read everything perfectly. The Shadow contained all the words that a woman in her early thirties had said and accumulated during her life. Kotaro was still clumsy at using the borrowed abilities of his left eye, and naturally he couldn’t read all the words at a glance. It was like listening to a radio broadcast through a thick layer of static, and he had been able to catch only scattered fragments. But what he’d heard was more than enough.
From the Shadow of the woman whose friends called her Kei, Kotaro had heard one word more clearly than any other: Sei-chan. Kotaro wasn’t sure whether she was calling out to him, or if he was hearing echoes of the name spoken to others. Sei-chan. Seigo Maki. That had been Ayuko’s nickname for him too.
marriage love me what about me liar what else can I do greedy serves her right never again
The words kept coming together among the writhing threads, forming a tangled mass, pulsating, intertwining, flying apart. Whispering, importuning, reaching out to Kotaro’s eye.
Sei-chan Sei-chan Sei-chan Sei-chan Sei-chan Sei-chan Sei-chan
Everything was falling into place. He would extract her story from her words and read it the way Yuriko Morisaki read his story, the way Galla read Shigenori’s story.
She was the killer.
His heart wouldn’t stop pounding. His left eye burned.
The day after the funeral, a small team of people got together at Kumar to compile a database of the mourners and thank them for their contributions.
Kotaro volunteered to help. Keiko Tashiro had written her address and contact number on her registry card. The bold handwriting slanted upward to the right. The address was in Adachi Ward. She’d included the name of her building and her apartment number. In the telephone field, she’d entered a mobile number.
The night of the wake, Kotaro had noticed she wasn’t wearing a wedding band. That and the fact that she’d left a mobile number not only suggested she was single, but that she was living alone.
As he hurried to compile the database, the coroner released details of the autopsy. Ayuko had been strangled with something like an electrical cord. Her blood contained traces of a sedative. She had been knocked out and strangled before her fingers were severed. The police were checking the record of calls to her mobile phone and searching for video footage of her after she left the taxi in Shibuya. The whole area was a commercial district with hundreds of security cameras. If any of them had captured images of Ayuko with someone else, it would be a major break in the case.
He had no time to lose.
Before he made his move, he had to talk to Seigo. He had to know more about his relationship with Keiko.
For three days Seigo was nowhere to be seen. Ayuko had been his business partner and fiancée. He would be extremely busy coping with the aftermath of her death.
The aftermath of her death. The killer had murdered an angel and destroyed her world. Now that world had to be put back together, piece by piece, without her.
On the fourth day, Kotaro decided he’d have to go ahead with his plan even if Seigo didn’t show at the office. But as he input his ID at the terminal near the door, he felt a hand on his shoulder.
“Morning. Thanks for all your help.”
It was Seigo. He was wearing a suit. His cheeks were hollow. Half of him had died with Ayuko, and what was left was perishing slowly. With each passing moment a little piece of his soul expired, yet he still took the trouble to thank each of his employees personally. He might be dying, but he was still Seigo Maki.
“Good morning,” Kotaro answered, not knowing what to say.
“You must be worn out. Are you holding up okay?”
“I should be asking you that.”
As Kotaro groped for the right words, Seigo input his ID. “You’ve been sleeping here, haven’t you? You must’ve missed a lot of class. I hope your parents aren’t upset. If it helps, I’m happy to talk to them anytime. Just let me know. I’ll apologize for keeping you from your studies.”
Come on, Seigo. Give me a break.
“It’s okay. My parents know what’s going on.”
“Really? Okay, then.” Seigo frowned and loosened his tie. “Today’s bank day. This has got to be the first time ever that I’ve worn a suit every day for a week.” He forced a smile—a miserable smile, it seemed to Kotaro—and turned to go.
“Seigo?” Kotaro was surprised at how shrill his voice sounded. “Um—this woman approached me at the wake. She said she was a friend of you and Ayuko.”
Seigo stopped and looked at him curiously. He shifted his bulging briefcase from one hand to the other.
“She said you guys were in the same club. The bicycle touring club.”
Seigo’s thick eyebrows rose as if to say, Oh, her …
“Were you good friends with the members?”
“They were Ayuko’s friends.”
“So you weren’t a member?”
“I went on a few rides with them. She dragged me along.”
Kotaro watched his face closely. “Do you remember someone named Keiko Tashiro?”
Seigo looked genuinely doubtful. “Tashiro?” He shifted the briefcase back to his other hand. “That must be Kei. She and Ayuko were friends all through college. Kei, that was her nickname.” He nodded. “We all went out for drinks a few times. Good-looking, kind of a narrow face?”
“Yes. Her eyes weren’t real friendly. She was wearing a lot of makeup.”
“That’s the one. She was into makeup big time.”
“She came up to me while I was clearing tables in the lounge and asked if I worked at Kumar. She wanted to know how you were doing.”
“Really?” Seigo glanced at the floor. “I’ve got a lot of people worrying about me.” He waved thanks and turned to go, but Kotaro wasn’t finished.
“What kind of person was she? Were she and Ayuko close?”
Seigo eyed him somewhat suspiciously. “I said they were.”
“Does she work in the same industry?”
“I don’t know that much about her.”
His phone started ringing. He took the phone out, nodded to Kotaro and walked over to his desk.
Keiko and Seigo were connected through their relationship with Ayuko, and only casually at that.
Sei-chan Sei-chan Sei-chan Sei-chan Sei-chan Sei-chan Sei-chan …
But then why were so many of her words about him?
It was all in her head. He didn’t even know.
He heard a sigh. “That’s the saddest thing I’ve ever heard.” A member of Drug Island, a woman Kotaro had been working with a lot recently, was standing next to him.
“He’s finally calling her ‘Ayuko.’ I wish he hadn’t waited until she died. I just hope they find who did it.” She never wore makeup; the skin around her eyes was raw from rubbing away the tears.
“But then there’ll be a trial, and the killer will have lots of excuses. And a lawyer to defend him. They’ll do a psychiatric evaluation. The lawyer will challenge the psychologists, and they’ll do another evaluation, may
be more than one. Different doctors will have different opinions. It’s practically guaranteed.”
Kotaro could only nod, but he had an unspoken answer: Don’t worry. It’s not gonna work out that way.
Keiko Tashiro wouldn’t get a chance to make excuses. She wouldn’t have the strength after her craving—a craving strong enough to drive her to murder—was sucked out of her. She’d never again be the person she was. No, she would confess willingly. And be sentenced to death.
When he got home, just before midnight, Asako was waiting. She dragged him into the kitchen and hit him with a nonstop lecture as she heated his dinner. He stared at the tabletop and accepted the criticism meekly as he ate.
“Kotaro! Are you listening?”
She pounded the table. He couldn’t remember when his mother had last scolded him this way. Was it in middle school? He’d been too well-behaved to need much monitoring.
“You keep saying ‘uh-huh’ but your brain is somewhere else. Everyone’s worried about you. We’re mad because we’re worried!”
She leaned across the table until her face was inches away. Blood-red threads dangled from her mouth. One of her elbows was on the table. Kotaro could see something wriggling in the shadow it cast on the tabletop.
He could read it.
“You had a fight with Aunt Hanako today, didn’t you?”
Asako’s eyes opened wide with surprise.
“She doesn’t mean any harm. She just thought you could put that stuff out with the regular garbage. She didn’t think you needed to call the city to come take it away. She doesn’t like being corrected, that’s all. She always thinks she’s right.”
Asako sat down with a thump, her eyes fixed on Kotaro. “Did Kazumi tell you that?”
He didn’t answer. He just looked away and munched on the last of his tea over rice.
“No, that’s impossible. She went to bed before you got home,” Asako said. She sounded like she was talking to herself.
“Thanks for dinner.” Kotaro piled his empty dishes and stood up. “Don’t worry about classes, Mom. Now that the funeral’s over, my schedule will go back to normal. I’ve got everything covered. Just relax, okay?”
He carried the dishes to the sink and put them in the water. When he turned around, she was standing right in front of him.
“Hey, don’t sneak up on me,” he joked.
She was still peering at him, eyes wide, watching him.
“Do you know what’s happening?” Her voice was faint. Kotaro could smell coffee on her breath. “Sometimes your left eye has this strange glitter, like molten metal.” She put a hand on his arm cautiously, as if she thought it might burn her. “Do you feel all right?”
He looked into her eyes, smiled slowly and put a hand over hers.
She snatched it away reflexively, as if in self-defense. Kotaro was her child, but Asako Mishima instinctively recoiled at his touch.
The touch of her son, who was mixed up with something not of this world.
“I feel fine, Mom.”
A single drop of water fell from the faucet into the water. The sound seemed to bring Asako back to reality. She took a step back.
“Gotta hit the sack,” Kotaro said.
He climbed the stairs, shut the door to his room, and stood there in the dark with eyes closed, waiting.
A blob of light swept across his left eye. He looked up. Where was she?
He crossed the room to the window and opened it. The street outside was wrapped in stillness. The streetlights glowed sleepily. A few stars twinkled overhead. It was the nicest season of the year, just before the early-summer rains.
Are you resolved to do this? asked the voice in his head.
“Yes,” he murmured. “I’m ready. I’ll make my move tomorrow.”
Then I am with you. Do not seek me out.
Silvery granules of light. Galla’s voice. The sound of words in light. Light from the heart, the energy of the will.
I am your shadow. I am with you.
He would be helped by an entity that was real but did not exist. A region that was real but did not exist would extend itself into his reality.
“I understand.” Then, Thanks for helping me, he thought at her.
Silence. He waited.
Lure your prey into darkness.
“Is that all I have to do?”
Again, silence. Kotaro nodded.
Finally the voice came again, but not as particles of light. It was like an inky mist, condensed from darkness.
You will regret this.
3
Vendôme Adachi Castle II was too grand a name for such a tawdry-looking collection of apartments. It just made the building seem cheaper. Keiko lived in apartment 201.
The glass doors to the lobby needed a security code. The building manager was not on duty round the clock, which suited Kotaro. The little office windows that opened on the lobby were curtained. There was a sign on the wall with the manager’s number.
Kotaro could make out TASHIRO on one of the mailboxes. He tried her apartment from the intercom. There was no answer.
He had started the day with classes followed by lunch on campus. He then went straight to Keiko’s apartment. It was twenty minutes on foot from the nearest subway station. The area was mixed residential and commercial, with houses, apartments, and the occasional convenience store. It seemed heavily populated, yet there were few people on the streets. The neighborhood was somehow lifeless.
He left his backpack in a locker at the station and stuffed what he needed in his pockets. He donned a pair of gaudy glasses picked up at a hundred-yen store, and a black cap from a big-box outlet near campus. Then he went for a stroll, scouting out public phones for the call he would make later and checking the route for security cameras.
He would make his move after nightfall and lure his prey into darkness, just as Galla had said. He would get her to leave her apartment and lead her to a spot that was shielded from the lights of the neighborhood. That would be no mean feat in the middle of Tokyo, but it was his mission.
Once she’s in darkness, Galla will do the rest.
Had this been an ordinary crime, the entire plan would’ve been laughably slipshod. But there was nothing ordinary about Kotaro’s backup.
Luckily there was a construction site just fifty yards from Vendôme Adachi Castle II. A placard announced plans to build another condominium. The site was still being prepared; the piles of construction materials would come later. A prefab operations shack stood ready at the edge of the site with two portable toilets alongside. The area was enclosed by a rope on stakes. Most of it was exposed to anyone passing by, but someone in the darkness beyond the shack would be invisible to people on the street just a few yards away. Better still, there was a big metalworking shop in the next lot, close to the shack, with an old zinc-plated roof that cast deeper shadows onto the site. A workshop like that in a residential area would be deserted in the evening.
This was the place, then. His decision made, Kotaro walked back to the station and retrieved his backpack. He found a coffee shop, took a seat inside and opened his laptop. Maybe his target had posted something new on her blog.
Security on the social network site she used was hard to punch through; he didn’t know how to use his web-crawling software to get inside. Even if he did, he’d have to explain to Maeda why he was monitoring a site that Kumar had never targeted before.
But he had an idea. He opened the official memorial homepage for Ayuko—he’d helped set it up during his shift the day before—and entered the following message in the condolences area.
I am a Kumar employee. At the memorial service, I encountered a few members of our late president’s university cycling club. I’d like to thank you for attending the funeral and giving me a glimpse of Ayuko Yamashina before she became president. I feel her loss eve
n more keenly now.
M
His ruse elicited an immediate response—from Keiko Tashiro herself.
I am a former member of the cycling club. Thank you for your message. If you visit my page, you can read more memories of Ayuko. I’ve also posted some photos from back in the day. Please enter KUMAR to get access.
I welcome everyone at Kumar to take a look.
Kei
He couldn’t have hoped for more. He sent mails to his Drug Island colleagues, including Kaname. She and Makoto were on shift together and instantly started reading the blog.
“Ayuko was very cute back then, but she turned into a beautiful woman.” Makoto was choking up as he texted Kotaro. “The older she got, the more beautiful she became. It shows what an upstanding life she led.”
Kotaro played along with their messages as he sniffed out Keiko’s lies and embellishments. Her memories of Ayuko were so full of false sentiment, it ought to have been clear to anyone. I’m not as naïve as Makoto, that’s for sure.
Kotaro’s message had drawn an instant response because it offered Keiko a chance to get closer to Kumar, and that meant Seigo. At the same time, she was afraid.
No matter how shameless she was, Keiko had murdered someone. She had to be under stress. She’d probably be sensitive to anything strange or out of the ordinary, any sign that she was under suspicion. Criminals are always looking over their shoulders to see if they’re being followed, even when they are alone.
If Kotaro dangled some kind of bait in front of her—something that pandered to her need to feel safe, to be confident that everyone saw her as just another friend and mourner of Ayuko—she’d be sure to swallow it.
He didn’t stay more than an hour in any one place. He even got back on the subway and went a few stations down the line, hanging out in coffee shops and getting gradually fed up with the self-absorption that ran through Keiko’s sentimental entries. He killed time until past five, then headed for the public phone he’d picked out near the station.
The Gate of Sorrows Page 33
